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Judgment
Tarlok Singh Chauhan, J
The instant petition has been filed for the grant of following substantive relief:-
i) That the auction notice for 01.07.2020 as detailed in Annexure A may kindly be quashed and set aside.
It is averred that the petitioner is an innocent man belonging to a poor family and due to financial constraints, has taken a loan of Rs. 7,00,000/- (Rupees Seven Lacs) from the respondent bank. However, due to financial difficulties the interest accumulated and now an amount of Rs. 9,49,174/- is due to the bank, which has now issued auction notice for the sale of the mortgaged property for 01.07.2020 at 11:00 A.M. at Kotkhai.
It is also averred that the respondent bank has already taken recourse to Section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments Act for realizing the loan amount, therefore, the property of the petitioner cannot be put to auction.
Lastly, it is averred that due to Covid- 19 pandemic, the Reserve Bank of India has already imposed a moratorium on the financial institutions for realizing the outstanding amount and, therefore, the notice of auction is bad in law.
We have heard learned counsel for the parties and have gone through the material placed on record.
As regards the first contention of the petitioner that parallel remedies are not available to the respondent bank, we really find no merit in the said contention as it is more than settled that if plural remedies are available to a litigant, then it is open to such litigant to choose, either one or both or multiple remedies, unless and until the same are expressly or impliedly barred.
Adverting to the facts of the instant case, there is nothing on record to suggest that the remedies resorted to by the respondent bank for auctioning the property of the petitioner are barred under General Law or under the Negotiable Instruments Act.
As regards the so called moratorium on the financial institutions for realizing the outstanding loan amount, the copy of such moratorium has not been placed on record or made available for perusal of the Court despite the fact that the case had been repeatedly adjourned on 22.06.2020 and 29.06.2020 for this purpose.
It cannot be lost sight that respondent bank is a creation of a statute having been created under the H.P. Agricultural Produce Marketing Development and Regulations Act, 2005, therefore, its dues have to be treated as public property. Law, in its majesty, benignly protects public property and behoves everyone to respect public property. Hence, the Court must be zealous in this regards.
We have tried our level best to accommodate the petitioner and repeatedly granted him time to file an undertaking clearing spelling out therein the mode and manner he would liquidate the amount in question. However he failed to do so and rather filed a vague undertaking before the Court, making it difficult to accept the same.
Here it shall be apposite to reproduce the paras 3 and 4 of the undertaking, which reads as under:-
"3. That I am in dire straits and thereby I undertake that I shall deposit the amount due to the respondent Bank within a period of six months.
That thereby I shall be much obliged, if the auction for the sale of the property is deferred for six months in terms of this undertaking."
At this stage, learned counsel for the respondents points out that ever since the petitioner was granted loan in the year, 2016, he did not choose to pay even a single penny, which only proves that the petitioner had no intention of repaying back the loan.
As observed above, the loan amount given by the respondent bank has to be treated as public property, therefore, the defaulter cannot be allowed to play truant with the public property.
In the given facts and circumstances, we find that no case is made out for indulgence by the Court for extending time to the petitioner to deposit the amount in question.
Consequently, there is no merit in this petition and the same is accordingly dismissed, so also pending miscellaneous application(s), if any. No order as to costs.